A look back at the 1966 Festival

FIFTY years ago, members of the Festival Committee were shocked to learn that the annual race meeting in 1966 would be a week later than usual. The race committee had not bothered to inform them.

The Festival of Kerry had its origins in a Carnival set up in 1957 to boost the annual Race Meeting at Ballybeggan. Florence O’Connor was then one of a small group of four who came up with the idea of developing the Carnival into the Festival of Kerry and replacing the Carnival Queen with a Rose of Tralee in order to capitalise on the internationally famous song.

“The organisation was founded to put life into Tralee during the week of Tralee Races— more specifically into the pubs and the streets of the town,” O’Connor explained. He was the main driving force of the early years of the Festival.

By the time the Festival authorities learned that the races would be a week later in 1966, too many arrangements had already been made, and it was decided to hold the festival the week before Tralee Races. This necessitated arranging alternative entertainment during the weekday afternoons when the horse racing was usually held. The Festival Committee arranged for Fossett’s Circus to put on a matinee each weekday afternoon. And a two-day horse trotting meeting was held in the Town Park.

The sixteen Roses were collected at the Grand Hotel and taken down Denny Street individually to the park on a sulky. A gymkhana was also arranged, with some of the country’s top horses competing. Tommy Wade, the country’s most famous international show jumper at the time, won the main event.

An air display was also planned involving airplanes, gliders, helicopters, and parachute jumping. The whole thing seemed to get a massive injection of publicity on the Sunday before the festival when there was a plane crash in Tralee.

Property developer John Byrne, who was due to be a judge at the Rose selection, crashed and wrecked his four-seater plane at the new grass landing strip on Ballybeggan Race Course. His aircraft ploughed through a ten-foot-high wall. Remarkablly, he escaped, suffering only a broken arm, and he proceeded to take his place among the judges with his arm in a cast.

Heimatzunft Huffingen, a German Folk Group comprising of over forty performers from the Black Forest, were special guests in their traditional costumes, courtesy of the Bonn Government. The group consisted of dancers, singers and a brass band. The visit was arranged by Gunther Beckers, the German Cultural Attaché. His boss, Ambassador Heinz von Truetzchler, was one of the festival’s distinguished visitors that year.

Guinness donated £560 in prize money for folk events, which were divided into four sections, the highlight being the “Come All Ye Competition,” which involved fourteen ballad groups from all over Ireland, and one from the Channel Islands. Between 4,000 and 5,000 people gathered to witness the final on the platform erected in front of the Ashe Memorial Hall.

The crowd was entertained during an interval by the Wolfe Tones, who came to national prominence in Tralee. The first time they were aired on Radio Éireann, was a recording made in Tralee in 1963 by Donncha Ó Dúlaing. The recording he aired was their rendition of “The Sash” — of all songs!

The prize for the 1966 contest included a recording contract, a TV test, and a gig in a London Ballroom. Veteran folk musician Teddy Fury saw his three sons carry off the premier honours and cash prize of £150. Finbar Furey’s performance on the uillean pipe introduced a new dimension to traditional entertainment, and the Fury Brothers made their mark, demonstrating real versatility and an obvious sense of tradition.

A major addition to the Rose contest that year was the introduction of a Rose from New Zealand, Loraine Stollery, who was duly selected as the Rose of Tralee. The contest had become so popular that it was decided from then on to extend the eligibity from young women with a Kerry grandparent, to those with any Irish ancestry. This extended the appeal of the contest to the whole Irish diaspora.